Armed With Pencils, Army of Census Workers Fans Out Into Afghan Outback

By CARLOTTA GALL

Published: July 13, 2003

FAIZABAD, Afghanistan, July 7—
Brand-new white sport utility vehicles have been bumping over the rocky roads and fording the rushing rivers of Badakhshan, Afghanistan's poorest and most remote northern province, high in the mountains of the Hindu Kush.

They carry the census takers, teams of Afghan government employees from the Central Statistics Office. In recent weeks, supplied with new tents, sleeping bags and satellite telephones by the United Nations, they have embarked on the first census in this country in 23 years.

''All the cars are stuck; the teams are all out on foot,'' said Ghulam Hazrat, 51, the controller of the project here and deputy director of provincial affairs at the Central Statistics Office in Kabul. ''It is very difficult because of the state of the roads.'' He said he had not heard from one of the teams in 11 days.

It is a mammoth task to reach every village in this vast land of some of the most inaccessible deserts and highest mountains in the world. The census takers intend to register every household and count every child and adult in each family. It will take them the better part of a year. They hope to finish next spring, before the national elections that are planned for June.

The census is occurring simultaneously in several parts of the country with consultations on a new constitution as the government takes advantage of the summer months to try to reach the more remote mountain areas. Both jobs are vital elements in preparing the way for the first democratic national elections to be held in a quarter of a century. But the census will also help understand and gauge the needs of the population.

''It will be very important for planning the economy and for health and education,'' said Muhammad Amin Hamimi, the governor of Badakhshan. ''We should know the number of people in the regions.''

He estimated that there were 1.2 million people in Badakhshan, but the statistics office's estimate is only 740,000.

No one really knows how many people live in Afghanistan, or where they live, Mr. Hazrat conceded as he sat on the floor of a bare room here in Faizabad, the provincial capital. His office assumes an estimated population of 23 million nationwide, though he emphasized that it was only an estimate. ''But soon we will know the answer,'' he said.

Every evening he records the figures that his teams call in as they progress through the villages of the 28 districts of Badakhshan. He calls in the numbers to Kabul, where workers enter them into a central computer.

Mr. Hazrat has 131 people covering the province, traveling in 13 teams. As they fan out they visit villages in pairs, recording every house they find, giving it a number, and interviewing every head of household, he said. They count the children and record the breakdown of adult women and men and of girls and boys under 18.

Each team is accompanied by a staff member of the national cartography office, who records the Global Positioning System coordinates of the village and makes a sketchy map of each village and town of more than 2,000 people.

Governor Hamimi, himself newly appointed, warned that Badakhshan was one of the poorest and most inaccessible places in Afghanistan.

Three districts -- Darwaz, Shighnan and Wakhan -- have no roads, and it can take 15 days walking from those areas to reach Faizabad, he said. Some residents find it quicker to go into neighboring Tajikistan and then over a border crossing to reach Faizabad.

Many districts are cut off for six to seven months a year by snow, the governor said. Even in good weather, people in these areas have little access to medical care.

An outbreak of typhoid killed many children two months ago in the northernmost mountainous district of Darwaz, he said. ''Without medicine and medical care people die,'' he said.

The census teams were all made up of city people, and Governor Hamimi predicted that they would underestimate the time needed to cover Badakhshan. ''When they estimate it will take three days, I am sure it will take them five,'' he said, laughing.

Mr. Hazrat admitted that his office had underestimated the scope of the task. ''The plan is to spend 40 days covering the whole province,'' he said, ''but unfortunately, because of the roads and the high rivers it will be longer. I don't really know how long -- but probably two months.''

One team left for Darwaz, which shares a border with Tajikistan. ''They just have their sleeping bags and their documents,'' he said. The men have been out of touch for 11 days, probably because there is no electricity and no cars with which to recharge the battery of their satellite telephone.

But Mr. Hazrat said that his teams could do the job. They have already covered most of 10 of Afghanistan's 32 provinces, starting with the ones where security is best. To date they have had no problems beyond the initial distrust of farmers who thought the government workers had come to seize their poppy harvest.

There will be a second round of gathering census information next year after the elections, Mr. Hazrat added. Teams of teachers will head back out to the villages to record more information on ethnicity, languages spoken, literacy levels, ages and marital status.

One thing that will not be recorded, the governor lamented, is the state of the roads in the country and in Badakhshan in particular.

''The main thing we could ask for is that foreign countries help us do something about our roads,'' he said. ''Please write about the roads.''

Photo: Badakhshan Province straddles the Hindu Kush in an often impassable part of Afghanistan where a government official, Ghulam Hazrat, worked in a bare office supervising the country's first census in 23 years. (Carlotta Gall for The New York Times) Map of Afghanistan highlighting Badakhshan.